


They Call the Rising Sun

by meeks00



Category: Generation Kill, Supernatural
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-08-17
Updated: 2011-08-17
Packaged: 2017-10-22 17:42:19
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 7,459
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/240797
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/meeks00/pseuds/meeks00
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When the world ends, all they have is each other. (Recon Marines + Apocalypse + Winchester Boys cameo + huddling for warmth.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Title is from The Animals’ “House of the Rising Sun.” For idrilfinial, who gave me a plot bunny that turned into a monster (so, when I said I’m shooting for 1,500 words, apparently I meant _five times that_ ). But be warned, this turned out a bit (a _lot_ ) darker and very different from what I had originally planned. I’ll try again later, maybe. I had to split this into two parts b/c it's too long--meant to be a one-shot.

Nate sees a flash of light across the bridge into Virginia—hears, feels, _senses_ Brad coming up on his six. Doesn’t turn to look at the man, waits for the light to fade, expects any moment for darkness to ensconce another HQ. 

“Rosslyn?” Brad asks. 

Nate nods and continues to stare past cracks snaking out like spider webs in concentric circles over the glass wall. The glass fogs up with condensation with each breath he takes, but it’s ephemeral, disappearing soon after it appears because the cold, like the dark, eats up everything. He keeps his finger straight on the trigger of the M-4 by his side, but his grasp is sweaty and tight around the hand grip despite the frigid night air. 

Nate blinks spots from his eyes. It’s blinding, that light, and he won’t ever get used to it, no matter how many cities and towns ( _buildings, homes, lives_ ) are leveled by it. And then the light is drawn in, an implosion of energy that won’t destroy its maker.

He feels a warm hand rest where his neck meets shoulder between his Kevlar helmet and his fatigues, glances back, sees ice all over that familiar face but doesn’t feel colder. 

“Yeah. Key Bridge went down with it,” Nate replies. 

He’d think it impossible for more tension to wire through the lines of that jaw, the planes of those cheeks, but he sees it all as if frost is climbing up Brad’s face in slow motion as the man glances past him through the glass. Brad squeezes his shoulder, once, tight. Nate forces back remorse, pulls on a semblance of detachment, and pushes away from the wall. The hand falls away. He clears his throat. 

“We tried to warn them,” he says after a moment.

Brad takes a step back, two. “We should have tried harder.” 

He steps back further to lean against the dust-covered counter, elbows resting on the edges, body slumping between the shoulders. Brad is long and lean and pale, and Nate misses the warmth of him nearby already. It’s so fucking cold these days that he almost wishes he had a new MOPP suit to take away the edge of the bite of the weather.

They’re centered in the leftovers of a Starbucks on the corner of 33rd St. NW and M Street, half a mile from the bridge. The street used to be lined with little shops and restaurants that looked like quaint townhomes, and now it’s been reduced to mounds of brick and concrete. Past the hills of debris of their Starbucks’ roof, they can see what used to be Georgetown. They’re covered by a black ceiling of a new-moon sky with only IR lights like makeshift camping lanterns out of the way of the window’s exposure.  

Nate turns around fully, slaps his hands against his thighs for warmth. Wants to say they’ll do better next time. But he’s not sure they have any chances left. 

He watches Brad watching him. Doesn’t quite feel as if he’s being scrutinized, maybe feels as if he’s being studied for a sit-rep for mental stability. They’re all looking out for one another more closely now. They’ve dealt with enough accidents recently, mental slips and negligent discharges to last them a lifetime. They’re all they’ve got, and sometimes it hurts Nate to look at the few of them that are left.

There is the sound of scuffling nearby. Brad doesn’t turn to look, but Nate does if only for something less painful to look at. He doesn’t see anything but shadows creeping past the corner, hears hushed voices.

“—did try hard. We _told_ them—”

“For chrissakes, Person, will you shut the fuck up? You have no respect for the—” 

“Walt, if you say ‘dead,’ I will fuck your shit up. Of course I have no respect for the dead—have you forgotten that the dead constantly try to _eat our_ _brains_?” 

“For the last time. They don’t eat brains. They just want to kill everybody.”

“Do you even realize what you just said? Is that seriously your idea of one-upping my argument? Telling me that dead things want to _kill_ _me_?”

“I’m sorry—”

“Damn straight!”

“I’m sorry for telling you like it is, you messed up hick!” 

Nate’s not sure that he can fault Walt for his patience finally snapping in the face of Ray Person, despite the fact that Walt had been able to keep his cool through the beginning stages of the goddamn Apocalypse coming down on them with everything Hell had been simmering with since creation. Sometimes it just takes one little thing to crack a person—not that Ray’s personality is anywhere close to little.

“Says you! You grew up on a goddamn ass-backwards barn! You told me you used to have cows and chickens and shit.”

“Next time we run into some fuckin’ ghouls or whatever,” Walt continues, raising his voice over Ray’s, “maybe you can stop screaming melodramatically about brains sooner and shoot ’em in the head!”

“I’m a goddamn ace shot, Hasser, and you know it. Don’t even try—”

Nate sighs and runs a hand through his hair. He glances up past his eyelashes at Brad, notes the pressed together lips, how the left side of his mouth is quirked almost imperceptibly upwards. 

“If you two are done bickering back there like a pair of shortbus, sister-fucking rednecks, I want my RTO on comms for survivors from Rosslyn,” Brad cuts in, and there is no longer any trace of that almost-smile. 

Nate unclenches his hands from his gun, listens past their breathing and their words for hints of anything else. Can’t even hear screams. Still finds it disconcerting to hope for them, if only to hear someone else out there, to give them an objective of any kind. Wonders if it’s the right decision to keep jumping bases for survival instead of staying and fighting for it. 

But they’ve seen what they’re up against, are down to so few men, have lost contact with countless others because of those blood-thirsty creatures and adrenaline-freaks with black eyes that can toss a man yards away with one blow. 

“Word to the motherfuckin’ streets, homes,” Ray says indignantly. “We were having an intellectual debate about the dietary habits of the undead.” He pauses. “And what constitutes being a hillbilly.” 

When he walks out, his hands are up as if he’s been caught red-handed at something, and dangling in one of them is a bag of chocolate-covered coffee beans. Walt comes out after Ray with an expression of chagrin on his face, rubbing the back of his neck with one hand. 

Nate sometimes wishes they’d chosen another location to hole up in other than somewhere that used to fuel the Georgetown area’s collective caffeine addiction. He couldn’t, however, resist the look of disdain on Brad’s face when they stumbled upon the place—a tightening of that jaw for a reason other than loss, a lighter reason that lifted something in Nate, and half of that Nate knows is probably from the sound of sheer glee from one Ray Person about the still-intact beverage and food products.

 “And for your information, Brad?” Ray goes on. “I am no longer your pretty little call-boy. This ain’t OIF or NAMBLA or even goddamn _Earth_ anymore, if we’re being honest here. And I’m not an RTO anymore either, but I’ll do it. Because you know what? Even though we told those dicksucks on the other side of the bridge that this was bound to happen if they kept tossing off rings of fire around their compound, I’d take ’em alive over dead if only so we can pretend we’re coming up on equal numbers with all of Satan’s retarded minions.” His grin is all teeth. “Need some bait if we’re going to kill some motherfuckers.”

Nate watches as Brad stares blankly at Ray. Sometimes it’s the only way to respond to one of these diatribes—any arguments only seem to fuel the man’s rants. This time, however, it doesn’t seem to work.

“And you do know that whoever’s—excuse me—that _whatever’s_ running the goddamn evil army of the Apocalypse really is a fuckin’ retard, don’t you?” Ray asks, looking at each of them in turn. 

He pops a few beans into his mouth, chewing so openly that a few of them fall out. He watches them fall to the floor before looking back up again. Nate tries not to smile. But of course Ray catches it.

“The LT knows what I’m talkin’ ’bout!” Ray exclaims, nodding at him with a grin. Brad shoots him a disappointed expression. “You’d think they’d at least have kept the Ritz-Carlton up—they’ve got to sleep somewhere, and everybody’s gotta love the perks, you know?” he says. “And last I heard from Chaffin in West Virginia a few weeks ago, they even took down the nude bars too, homes! Soon the enemy’s armies are gonna turn right around and march right back into Hell again if there’s no good ol’ American pussy anymore. Am I right?” He pauses. “Hey, maybe that should’ve been _our_ first move. We —”

“Stop,” Walt interrupts quickly. “Stop talking.” 

Walt puts a hand over Ray’s face, part of it on his mouth at least for silence, but it’s mostly a familiar gesture to shock the man into coming right back down into the here and now from wherever his mind goes from time to time. Walt uses his free hand to nab the bag of chocolate-covered coffee beans. 

“Hey!”

“I think you’re all set with these,” Walt says, holding the bag out of reach as Ray makes a grab for it.

“Comms, Ray,” Brad repeats. 

Nate thinks Brad is the only one who can overlook the bullshit of everything today and stick to a linear thought process. His own mind seems to travel to the future, wondering what the hell they’re still going on for when it seems like there’s less and less of this world to keep trying to save and hold onto. 

Ray makes a frustrated noise as he pushes Walt’s hand away, but then he just sighs. Walt nudges him on the shoulder with a hand, and Ray scowls, but he walks back toward the kitchen. Walt turns back to Brad and Nate with a faint grin. 

Nate looks over his face. Walt still looks young, like the innocent nice-guy from when they were all still in Iraq, amused at the moment as he usually is and normally only shows when Ray’s not looking—Nate hopes that can last. 

Walt shakes his head before mock saluting them and following Ray out.

Nate remembers when an accidentally too-quick fight response had that face looking older than it had any right to be, turned into a mental flight in the aftermath with the image of a man with a bullet through one eye ricocheting like a specter over every face of every man in his platoon. It caught hold of Walt hard though, made him go silent, and Nate wonders at the fact that he now thinks of those days, among others, as better days. 

He thinks of the things they’ve done recently, the things they’ve killed, the people. 

How they had to do it. 

Any way that would work. 

And they’re running out of ammunition.

*****

Later, Nate glances over at Brad, who is grimy, as if all they do all day is sift through dirt and the history of what used to be _home_ and what is now something else that Nate tries not to think about. 

They smell like an odd blend of cordite and sulphur—good and evil. The stench stings his nose. He shivers.

“Cold, sir?”

Brad walks over, turns around and slides to a sitting position beside Nate. He draws his long legs up, rests his wrists on the knees, lets his fingers dangle. Nate glances at him from the corner of his eye, shifts his gun so the butt is resting at his hip, the barrel against his shoulder. He feels the other man’s body heat bleed from the length of their touching thighs, touching shoulders.

“I’m not your commanding officer anymore, Brad. As Ray pointed out, this is no longer OIF,” he says, aiming for a light tone and falling desperately flat. “You don’t have to call me ‘sir’ anymore.” 

Brad just looks at him, and Nate wonders if Brad only sees the world in ranks and objectives—he’s always alert, always combat ready, always there when Nate needs him. 

Nate wonders if there’s something wrong with him, thinking of all these things when he should be figuring out what their next move is. When he should be worrying about the HQ across the Key Bridge. When he should be hoping for survivors instead of assuming there are none. 

Nate went to check back in the kitchen earlier where Ray has been trying to make contact now for a few hours. The silence on the other end of comms is beginning to bleed into the former RTO, and Nate found the subdued air disconcerting, something of a reality check that their small group of leftover humans could finally, truly be affected to the utmost. 

The bickering began again shortly before Nate left the kitchen. He thinks that may be Walt’s main weapon of distraction in the few moments that actually bring Ray down.

Nate mentally shakes himself, shifts his hold on his gun, flexes his fingers for warmth. “You call Ray and Walt by their names, did even when we were in Iraq,” he goes on. “Is it because I was your CO?”

“You have a nickname that you’d prefer?” Brad’s words send puffs like clouds into the night air, and Nate sometimes wonders why the man’s called the Iceman when all Nate thinks of when he thinks of Brad is warmth.

Nate can’t help but grin, but he ducks his head down so Brad doesn’t see. “Nate will do.”

There is the warmth of that hand again, this time on his knee, and he’s psyching himself up to look over to his left, but then he hears scuffling footsteps.

This time they’re coming from outside.

Too many for a single person, the rhythm too quick to be human. He feels Brad freeze beside him for all the warmth the man’s body radiates. The hand on his knee retreats. Nate thinks of Brad’s nickname again, remembers why it was introduced in the first place, and tries to calm his heart rate. 

They were trained for combat. Combat today is just an evolved form against an ever-changing enemy.

A faint sound of metal against wood, the feel of a magazine pressed into his free hand, warmth of fingers against fingers. He glances at Brad, takes the magazine fresh from the crate beside the man, stuffs it into a slat on his flak vest. 

He catalogues how many rounds he has left in the magazine of his weapon, thinks of the crates of ammunition they brought over in their humvee from the last compound. How they haven’t lasted as long as he’d hoped. Mind moves quickly with thoughts about when to move, what to do next, where the closest building he can remember is in the area so they can restock. 

There are the footsteps again. He sees two shadows in the pitch black of the night. Darker outlines like smudges on black paper, warped in shape—animalistic, fur, curved spines, bi-pedal when standing. 

Nate draws his gun up, aims through the cracked portion at the edge of the glass wall where he stands, feels Brad uncoil from the ground to cover his six. 

He locks the first one at the head. They’ve found, through extensive trial and error, that most of the _creatures_ they deal with will die if blown to pieces, will slow down more quickly without a head, won’t come back again if they’re burned to ash.

The others, though—it’s the people they have a problem with. A pair of them with their black eyes and wicked smiles and biting sarcasm killed three of the men before Nate was forced to call a tactical retreat. At night he still dreams of their faces.

Brad taps his shoulder lightly. Engage. The head of that first creature swings in their direction. Nate fires. The second one runs at them. The shot fired by his ear leaves him deaf for a few seconds, but there are two bodies down in front of the window. 

And then there is the sound of footsteps again. A cacophony of them, rubble scraped aside by running feet, paws, claws scratching pavement. Another one comes into view, and then another. 

 It sounds like an army, and after a moment of watching, Nate doesn’t just see stains of black in the night, but a river of writhing bodies in front of the store. 

There’s an army of them. They stand there as if waiting for something.

 “Well fuck me,” Brad says, voice flat. 

Nate doesn’t know if what he feels now is fear or shock, and then he thinks it might be hysteria climbing up his throat when he laughs. 

 “Just once, Brad, I’d maybe like to see you flip your shit,” he says. 

“I may have to disappoint you on that one, sir,” Brad says. 

“Seems like we have a shorter timeline to work with.” He’s going for a light tone again, but all that comes out is something cracked. 

Then Nate hears shots fired from behind them, muffled shouts—probably out back in what’s left of the kitchen. Nate glances back, hopes they’re not flanked, thinks of Ray and Walt and hopes they're not as fucked and have the sense to get the hell out of Dodge.

“Fuck,” he whispers, but then shots are being fired just by his ear again.

He turns toward the window, watches as the creatures surge forward, curls his finger over the trigger and opens fire. 

The glass wall of a window shatters in a spray of gunfire and thrashing beasts as they crash through. After that it’s a frenzied chorus of gunshots and growls, muzzle flashes sending sparks across his vision, curved fangs and spit, splatters of blood. He fires methodically, calculated shots, keeps the rest at bay. All too soon he’s dropping an empty clip, shouldn’t be surprised he isn’t taken down in the few seconds it takes to reload because Brad is there at his three. 

They’re backed against the counter, shooting in tandem, aiming for heads. Can’t tell if they’re exploding, but bodies keep dropping. They’re piling at the edge of the window, just on top the sill, just inside the shop. 

In the dark, in the glare of the IR light sitting on the far side of the counter, and in the flash of whizzing bullets it looks like they’re creating a dike, except not out of sandbags.

He’s breathing heavily as he fires, hears it loudly with his heart pounding when the pull on the trigger requires less effort. Drops his gun, feels for his KA-BAR on his flak vest, draws it, finds comfort in the sound of 1095 carbon steel sliding out from a leather sheath. 

Brad fires three shots when another one jumps at them, then Nate hears the clink of metal on cracked pavement, hears another whisper of steel on leather. 

There are still a few of them left—he sees them stalking in front of the store. 

“They’re waiting for something,” Brad says, his voice soft and tense.

The creatures stalk closer—Nate counts five—but they stay just outside of the gaping hole where the glass wall used to be. They tread on fallen beasts, broken glass, rubble. Rumbling growls from deep in their chests seem to echo. 

The closest one seems especially ugly in the IR light, looks extra hungry too, stalks on all fours back and forth in front of him. Its eyes have no irises, black all the way through and glittering. Nate can almost see his own reflection in them. Looks away at the next one and tries not to shudder. Several others are in his direct line of sight, standing back on their hind legs behind the one up front. 

“Brad—”

Nate doesn’t glance to his side, but Brad must have felt something stiffen in his arm, heard something raw in his voice, because he says in a sharp voice, “Nate—”

“Well well! I thought we’d cleaned out D.C. at the beginning of this little shit-show. Apparently I was wrong.” 

Nate knows that voice.

*****

  
[Continued](http://meeks00.livejournal.com/4037.html)   



	2. Chapter 2

Ray walks up from the left, stands beside the beasts, lets them walk around him, lithe and powerful, winding like snakes. He’s holding a lantern in one hand, a reserve from their stocks, blinding in this night lacking moonlight. He rests his other hand on the top of one of the creatures. 

“Ray?” Brad’s voice cracks. 

“Oh, Bradley,” Ray says, clicking his tongue and shaking his head. “Don’t you worry. Your dear pal Ray-Ray is hanging around in here somewhere. He really doesn’t ever shut up, does he?” He laughs. “Quite a mouth on him too. You should really listen to him go right now.” He pauses. “Actually rather annoying. I know I was desperate for a new meat suit, but this is ridiculous.”

And then Nate sees that his eyes are black, no white around brown irises, smile all teeth, and malicious, and Nate knows he’s gone. 

“What—,” Brad starts, but he cuts himself off. Nate reaches out a hand, grasps the man’s wrist, feels the quick beats of a racing heart rate. 

“Worried about Walt? He’s… _resting_. Killed my pet ghoul, if you must know.”

Brad steps forward, one quick step, all of his strength laid out with hate. “I will _kill_ you if—” Nate holds onto that wrist, holds fast because he has nothing else left to hold onto but this anymore.

Ray laughs again. “You really do have quite the rapport with your men, don’t you? Just looking at you both makes me feel all warm and squishy inside. Does Nate know how you feel, Brad? Have you told him? Ray knows— _Walt_ knows even. Boy, do _they_ know about relationships! You boys really jumped on it after the military fell, didn’t you? No longer a ‘Don’t ask, don’t tell’ policy, and you devil dogs go _nuts_. But dear Walter isn’t in any state to talk right about now.” His smile then is thin and sharp. 

Nate steps forward, keeps a hold of Brad. “What do you want?”

Ray tilts his head to the side, a gesture of askance that looks alien on him. “Hell on Earth. All of _you_ off of it. What anybody wants, really.” He grins then. “How about we get on with it?”

He taps the head of the creature he’s petting, and it’s like a signal for all of them to charge.

Nate lets go of Brad’s wrist but still feels Brad’s body coil tight beside his own, and then all Nate sees, hears, feels is his heart thumping, a chorus of growls, feet pounding ground, a flurry of pitch black fur. 

Brad’s warmth gone. 

He whips his knife up and slashes to the side. Feels the thick heat of blood wash over his hands and doesn’t stop until he feels more. Drops splatter onto his face. He thinks they might be poisonous, but he can’t stop to worry about the sting. 

In the midst of all the noise engulfing him, the sudden, sharp pain on his right side, the burn of his exhausted muscles, and the blood pumping quickly through his veins, he wonders how he can feel so cold now that he’s almost burning with it.

And then there’s an unlikely sound.

A growl, a different kind, a roaring engine and the blinding flash of headlights. The smell of burning rubber. He downs another of the creatures, finds a lull as Brad stabs one through the neck and slices sideways. A spurt of blood hits the side of Nate’s face, but he’s staring at the black muscle car spinning its tires as it squeals to a sudden stop.

Muzzle flashes firing out of the passenger side door, more of those creatures falling, skidding to a dead stop at his feet. 

“What the _fuck_?” he hears Ray yell. He turns to Nate and Brad and raises a hand, fingers together and palm facing outwards. Nate is picked up off his feet and slammed up and over the counter against the back wall. Pinned, paralyzed. Feels Brad next to him.

All the creatures are dead, bodies piled up. The passenger side door of the car swings open and a man unfurls from the seat. Up and up, as tall as Brad, maybe, shaggy hair and a hesitant gait as if he’s not yet used to his own height. 

“ _You_ ,” Ray spits, and Nate can’t remember ever having heard such hate in his voice before.

The driver’s side door swings open, another man climbs out, not as tall but by no means short. “Well hey there!” he says. “Did you miss us?” He pulls out a shotgun and shoots Ray right in the chest. 

“No!” Brad yells. 

They watch as Ray falls backwards, the lantern rolling away from his hand. The taller man runs forward, towing a white bag and spraying white crystal rocks in a circle around Ray’s body as Ray screams hate. The other one cocks his gun again and aims. When the circle of white around Ray is complete, Nate feels that paralytic hold on him fade, and then he falls to the ground. Brad thumps down beside him, and then they’re both up and running at the two men from the car. 

“Don’t shoot him!” Nate calls out. “It said Ray’s still in there!” 

The one with the shotgun turns to look at him. “No shit, Sherlock.” He turns to the other man. “I hate it when civilians try to tell me how to do my job.”

Brad heads toward him with intent, and then the taller one pulls out a Glock from the small of his back. “Stop. Don’t come any closer. We’re trying to help,” he says, holding up one hand in a placating gesture even as he aims the gun at Brad. His wrist is steady, grip secure; he’s used to wielding firearms and knows how to shoot.

“By shooting him?” Brad asks, raising one brow, but he halts anyway.

“It’s rock salt, genius,” says the one holding the shotgun. “Where have you been for the past few months of the Apocalypse?”

“If you don’t let me go, I’ll rip your precious little Ray-Ray up from the inside out,” Ray hisses. “I’ll make his insides become his outsides. I’ll—”

“Shut up, you demonic son of a bitch,” says Shotgun. 

“My Lord will come, and he will smite you like the scum you are,” Ray spits, face contorted with rage and hate. 

“Sorry to have to tell you this, but you and I both know he’s not coming for you—he’s staging his final countdown in Rosslyn, and you know it. Too bad you can’t join him with all of your little pets, though,” Shotgun taunts. “Get rid of it, Sammy.” 

“ _Exorciso_ _te, omnis spiritus immunde_ ,” Sammy recites, voice dropping gravely, words falling rhythmically. 

Brad steps forward, stops when the shotgun is aimed in his direction. Nate reaches out to grip his forearm. The look Brad sends him can’t be described as anything but ice. It’s almost enough to make Nate let go. Almost.

“Let him finish,” says Shotgun. “We’re doing you a favor here, Rambo.”

Ray chokes, gurgles, curses at them even as he doubles over, writhes within that white circle. “When my Lord consumes your world, he’ll raise me up again, more powerful than your so-called God. And then I’m coming for you, I’m going to have you Winchesters on a _skewer_.”

Shotgun steps closer, but he stays carefully away from the line. “Not if we finish Lucifer off first,” he says, and there’s something triumphantly malicious in the tightening of his jaw, in lines of that cruel grin.

“ _—in nomine Dei, Patris omnipotentis,_ ” Sammy goes on.

“Latin?” Nate asks Dean in a hushed voice beneath the rhythm of Sam’s steady cadence of words. “An exorcism?” 

He remembers the semester he took of Latin at Dartmouth, wonders now if they weren’t being taught what they needed—exorcism rituals instead of all the possible root words the future doctors of America would need at med school.

“Look at you,” Shotgun says, voice lightening into a sing-song tone, brow raised and lips curling up on the side. He looks almost like a modern James Dean with a rougher edge, worn brown leather jacket with scorch marks, five o’clock shadow, sure grip on that shotgun like he was born wielding it. “Sam, I think this guy over here might be able to beat you at Jeopardy. You two can duke it out for the Geek Boy title of the Apocalypse.”

Sam—Sammy?—pauses long enough to shoot Shotgun a dark look. “In the middle of an exorcism here, Dean.”

Dean makes a face. “I’ll exorcise your face.” 

Sam turns away, finishes his lines, takes a step back as the wind kicks up. Ray’s head falls back, and he screams, loud, wrenching, a black cloud pouring out of his mouth in a column toward the sky. It drops flat into the circle of white, lights up the ground in deep black and bright orange flickering sparks before it’s gone. 

“What the hell?” Nate mutters. 

“If you mean ‘back to Hell,’ then you’re damn straight it is,” Dean says with a grin. He nudges Ray’s boot with a toe as Ray rolls over with a groan. “Good morning, Sunshine. Welcome back.”

Brad stalks forward just as Dean lowers the shotgun and Sam lowers his Glock, kneels down over Ray who’s pushing himself up and curling over his middle. 

“Ray?”

“Fuck, fuck, you shot me, motherfucker,” Ray chokes out, glancing past Brad at Dean.

Dean grins. “It’s just rocksalt. Did you want to be that demon’s temporary meatsuit for longer? I’m sure we could have worked somethin’ out.”

“Dean.”

“ _Sammy_.” 

Sam sighs. 

“Who are you? How did you know to exorcise Ray?” Nate asks. He can already feel his sweat drying in the late night air, feels the adrenaline being washed from his system, and in the aftermath he just feels numb.

“We’ve been following that demon since Baltimore,” Sam says. “I’m Sam, this is Dean. We’re—”

“Shit, _Walt_!” Ray shouts, pushing up to a stand and pushing Brad aside. Brad glances back at Nate, who nods at him to go follow Ray who’s stumbling back toward the kitchen. 

As their footsteps fade, Nate stands there in front of Sam and Dean and their still rumbling Chevy, willing himself to follow his men, unable to unstick his feet at the thought of another one of their faces plaguing his dreams at night. 

“Demons,” he says, pushing those thoughts away. 

“Yeah,” Sam says. His voice is softer, as if picking up on Nate’s thoughts. 

“Black eyes, allergic to holy water and salt, sarcastic sons of bitches lapping up Lucifer’s speeches about how God rejected him, living proof of why Chaucer claimed men should never scorn women,” Dean adds.

Sam turns to him with an exasperated expression. “That wasn’t Chaucer.”

“Sure, throw your Stanford education in my face in the middle of the end of the world as we know it,” Dean replies, frowning.

“It was Congreve,” Nate says quietly. “’Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned.’ _The Mourning Bride_. A lot of people mistake that as Shakespeare.”

Dean laughs softly, shakes his head. “I mean it. Jeopardy. Geek Boy title of the Apocalypse. That would totally make up for the recent lack of entertainment. You two—”

“Looks like you guys were doing all right without us,” Sam cuts in, looking pointedly at Dean. 

Nate glances around, looks at the creatures he and Brad took down, some with their KA-BARs, remembers thinking this might be it. Can’t bring himself to try to remember if what he felt then was relief or despair.

“Hey, you’re bleeding,” Dean says. He gestures at Nate, who glances down at his right side, suddenly feels numbness fade away into an ice cold burning sensation. He puts his hand on top of the long gash there. “Sammy—get the kit.”

“It’s not bad,” Nate protests. 

“Who knows what poison rawheads have in their claws,” Dean says, walking over. “You never know where a demon’s little lapdogs have been.” 

“Rawheads? Will they come back?” Nate asks, kneeling down to look at one.

“Come back?”

“We realized that if we didn’t burn some of the other kinds of creatures they wouldn’t stay dead,” Nate explains.

Dean grins at him, nudges him so he sits down. “Well you guys are quicker on the uptake than some. Marines, huh?” He nods at Nate’s fatigues.

“Recon,” Nate replies, leaning back on his hands as Dean gingerly pulls aside the ripped sides of his shirt. “You?”

“Naw,” he says, grinning like the idea amuses him to no end. The smile fades somewhat, and he looks toward the car when Sam is digging around in the trunk. “My dad was a Marine though.” 

Sam comes back from the car with a small duffel. He pulls out a bottle and hands it to Dean. 

“Rawheads won’t come back,” Dean adds after a moment as he unscrews the cap. “They’re pretty much dogs warped from time in Hell. Ugly sons of bitches, sure, but they die just as dead as any normal animal.” There’s a sharp sting when the alcohol is poured over the gash, but then it’s soon over, and the drops start to run clear. “Doesn’t look like you need stitches. Lucky,” Dean says.

From the corner of his eye, Nate sees Brad and Ray coming out with Walt held up between them. There is blood trickling down the side of Walt’s face from his right temple, and his wrist looks broken from where it hangs across Ray’s shoulder. 

Nate pulls away and stands, feels lightheaded, probably from blood loss, but he doesn’t care. He sees Brad watching him, his eyes dropping to the newly cleaned gash.

“You OK?” Brad asks.

“Just a scratch,” Nate replies. “How’s Walt?”

“Just got tossed around a bit, Nate,” Walt replies. His voice is soft, a bit slurred. “I’m all right.” 

“Shut the fuck up, Walt, you are not all right. You’re fucked the hell up,” Ray says angrily, but he’s gentle as he and Brad let Walt down beside Nate. 

“Stop it, Ray. I know it wasn’t you.” 

Ray sits down next to him, draws his knees up, swipes his hands across his temples before pressing his palms against his eyes. “How do you know anything?”

Walt laughs softly. “I’m pretty sure that you don’t have supernatural powers and can’t toss me around without touching me. I know you say I’m about as smart as the barn animals I grew up raising, but I’m not that stupid.” 

Ray doesn’t look up.

“Don’t beat yourself up about it, kid,” Dean adds. “Happens to the best of us.” He glances at Sam, who presses his lips together in a straight white line. Dean smiles a shit-eating grin that could rival Ray’s.

“You don’t have any control when a demon possesses you,” Sam explains haltingly. Ray shakes his head.

“Ray, stop it.” Walt nudges Ray’s shoulder with his own. Pulls Ray’s hands down with his good hand, ducks his head down so they’re looking at one another directly eye-to-eye. “I guess you were right about ghouls too, huh? About them wanting to eat us?” 

He licks his lips, the corners of his mouth pulling up into a sideways grin. He reaches out a finger, runs it over a thin line of red still dripping beads of blood on the side of Ray’s neck, turns to look at the rest of them, that smile sliding away. 

“The-the ghoul was licking the blood up,” he says. “I shot its head off.”

Ray chokes on a laugh. “I think it mentioned wanting brains too.” 

“Must’ve been a retarded one then,” Brad says, “if it was going after you.” 

Ray shoots him an offended look. 

“I hate to break up this relief party,” Dead breaks in, “but we’ve got to hit the road.” He glances at Sam.

“Need to get there by daybreak,” Sam adds.

“Where?” Nate asks. 

“Rosslyn,” Sam says. “We think that’s where Lucifer is bringing his troops together.”

“It’s the reason why that demon was passing through this way—with all of those rawheads. Lucifer’s going to be _pissed_ that all of them are dead,” Dean says with a delighted smile as he looks around at the bodies around them. “Some job you boys did here. Kind of makes me wish we’d been here earlier.” 

“We’ll go with you,” Brad says. Nate looks at him, but Brad doesn’t look back.

Sam shakes his head. “This is something we need to do alone,” he replies slowly. 

“What are you going to do?” Nate asks. 

Dean grins. “Make things right.”

When they leave, the aftermath is a circle of rock salt outside of a Starbucks, the smell of burnt rubber, the sound of ancient Latin verses in the night air. Nate thinks it feels like hope.

*****

Later that night it’s cold, so cold. The alcohol Dean poured down his side dried quickly, but the slit in his shirt is letting in the cool air. They moved to a dilapidated store further down the street, more of a roof here except up front, and Nate sits there staring out toward Rosslyn, not sure what he’s waiting for.

He suddenly feels warmth at his six, knows it’s Brad there, one of the few things that chases the cold away these days.

“I think Ray and Walt are going to be fine,” Brad says. He walks to Nate’s three and sits down. “Ray’s bitching as loudly as ever while Walt pulls out some of that rock salt from his chest.” 

Nate can’t hear them, but this place has a basement, figures maybe isolation in this way can be more like privacy than a kill zone. 

“That’s good to hear,” Nate says after a moment.

It’s quiet then. 

Nate has to suck in a breath when cold, cold fingers trace the scratch along his right side. He pulls away slightly, turns to look a Brad beside him, who’s looking back with that ice cold expression. 

Then there’s a flicker in the eyes, a tug at the corner of his mouth, and Nate realizes that he just needs to look more closely to crack the surface of that Iceman exterior. 

“Brad—” A question he can’t finish, a hope he doesn’t want to break.

Brad shakes his head, slowly leans forward, and then it’s a sudden shock of soft lips and cold hands and too many clothes, but it all makes a sharp pang of heat strike Nate through and through. It pools down low, heavy, and when Brad nudges his leg between Nate’s, Nate can’t help but groan. He shifts onto his knees, puts his hands on steady shoulders, is pulled close, and he doesn’t remember then what the cold felt like.

“Brad,” Nate says again, when they break away, but he cuts himself off when Brad’s tongue licks down his collar bone. “ _Fuck_ ,” he mutters. 

Nate hears Brad laugh, feels it in the puff of hot breath against his skin, and then he’s pulling his shirt off, Brad’s off, unzipping pants and pushing down briefs. 

Brad’s hand is cold on his cock, tight, so tight, but so good that Nate’s digs his fingers into the man’s back. He bucks into that hand, pushes his leg against Brad’s hard cock against his thigh, hears a groan and is pushed back onto his back. He doesn’t care about small stones digging into his back, just wants more and can’t get enough of those hands, those lips on his chest. 

He shivers when Brad pulls away, makes a small noise of protest, a question, and sees a flash of white teeth in a sly grin. And then Brad’s ducking his head down, his mouth is taking Nate in, hot and slick and wicked tongue sliding around the head of his cock. He rests his hand on the back of Brad’s head, grasps at the short strands of hair, swears he can feel a smile on those lips around him. 

He comes in sharp, sudden spurts, can barely think as Brad sucks it all down and swallows. And then he can taste himself on Brad’s tongue when the man crawls over him, presses along the length of him, kisses him deep, slides that tongue across the line of his lips. 

He pulls away, stares up at Brad, takes in swollen lips and slight grin and bright blue eyes. Reaches his hand down and raps it around Brad’s thick cock, pumps his hand once, twice, watches Brad’s face twist, feels its warmth when the man buries it against his neck. Feels muscles spasm under his free hand around Brad’s back. He nips at his ear, tastes sweat, feels himself get hard again when Brad whispers his name in a broken voice against his neck. 

When Brad comes, Nate doesn’t let go. He does pull back and draw him in for a long kiss that goes on long after they’re done. 

Doesn’t ever want to let go. Wonders at how it took him to the end of the world to get where he’d been heading his entire life. 

***** 

Later, they sit there side-by-side staring out the window. Naked, cold again, but then Brad wraps an arm around Nate’s neck. Nate leans in, is pulled up against a warm chest, feels a warm breath against his ear, feels warm lips against his neck. 

“Who knew you were a cuddler?” Nate says, can feel his lips pulling up on each side into a grin. It feels like something inside him is cracking wide open, letting in heat in the midst of having strived so hard to keep out the cold for so goddamn long.

“I’m just doing this to keep warm, Nate,” Brad replies easily. “Survival tactics, you know.” 

Nate leans his head back, feels another press of warm lips on his temple. Closes his eyes.

And then there is a flash of light, bright enough to penetrate the shield of his eyelids with red and orange. He blinks his eyes open, but this time he has to cover his eyes with his arm from its brilliance. 

When it fades, he drops his hand, feels Brad’s fall on top of his own, squeezes back and isn’t sure if what he feels then is relief, remorse, retribution. Remembers all the other flashes of light like this one, dim in comparison, destruction complete. 

Those were later pulled inward, deliberate and menacing, but this time the light is eaten up by darkness, and the ensuing silence is peaceful instead of empty.

Nate doesn’t need to know how it happened to know that it’s over.

*****

When he wakes, for some reason he thinks he’s in Iraq. He thinks of ranger graves and his first impression of being privileged enough to walk the sands of ancient Eden, grains of history and hundreds of years of wars and hopes and dreams beneath his boots. He thinks of the burden of 22 men on his shoulders—duty, responsibility, love. And he feels so cold.

But then he feels Brad along the length of his side, hip against hip, one long arm resting across his chest, a long leg nestled between his own. Beneath him the still-intact linoleum floors are ice cold, and he can feel stones digging into his back, can taste dust in his mouth. 

But he can also remember soft lips and a wicked tongue, calloused palms and exploring fingers, wants more but is content for now with puffs of hot breath against his neck. 

Above them, the sky is melting from deep purple to bruised hues of blue and green, and over the closest mound of brick and concrete Nate can see a curve of light. He watches the sun rise, follows its progression as it crawls upward, grows larger as if to watch over them, begins to radiate heat and hope. 

He rolls over, wraps his arms around Brad, grins at the small noise of protest at being jostled, slowly falls into an easy sleep for the first time in months with his head resting on Brad’s chest. He falls asleep feeling so warm.

 _fin_

  


  



End file.
